Shopping is social. Indian startups have realized this thereby leading to a sudden rush in to this market. The latest startup to join the bandwagon is Mumbai based Clipr. Launched by Pratik Poddar and Nikhil Vij, the startup wishes to be an online recommendation platform for window shopping and gift recommendations. Clipr crawls through your Facebook Graph and recommends you products that you may like to buy, gift your friends and earn rewards for performing such activities. One may call it a Pinterest model for online retail in India or Fancy but it has more to it.

How does Clipr work?

Clipr works with a Facebook login to pull out your personal information and activites. The good part is that your profile is created automatically within seconds but the bad part is that with no other option for logging in, Clipr is curbing its growth. There are people who don’t use Facebook or are moving out of it.

Once you have logged in, you are asked to select a minimum of 5 interests from the list. The interests list that can be edited at any point helps the platform to suggest you products based on your preferences.

1. The Home Page has the trendy cards design that is preferred by most startups today. The default look of Clipr is showcasing the trending products based on the user’s interests. If something catches your interest, you have the choice either to Tag (tagging your friend) or Clip (storing to your profile).

On click of any product, you will find the details of the product such as how many people have viewed, clipped it and product details. The price item and seller details are also provided. However, the purchase activity happens on the seller’s website and not on Clipr. In addition to this, the user can also see associated content such as Similar Products and People who clipped this also clipped. The below screen grab shows how products are displayed.

On the Home page, you can browse more products based on Groups, Your Friends and Trendsetters. Your Friends option lets you browse through the Clip Boards of your friends that have been added after you log in via Facebook. Trendsetters also give you the same privileges but they are the set of most active people on the platform.

Clipr has not provided any opportunity to discuss about the products or share on networks. Adding Facebook comments would be a good option.

2. Add Product is a feature that gives the users the power to add products to the platform. Clipr has listed supporting websites that it has a tie up with. Letting users drive the platform is a cool decision but that also leads to the question of keeping a check on what is being uploaded. In the books section, I came across a certain book that was uploaded more than once. Would be interesting to know how the founders are trying to tackle a common problem with user generated communities.

3. Clip Board is the preview of your clips in a magazine form along with the information about your clips, followers, following, etc. The clips are showcased in an amazing magazine format grouped under various categories. You can share these clips on Facebook or choose to buy them on the designated portals. The below screen grab gives a look of how the clips are showcased.

4. Gift feature has been incorporated but nowhere near to the concept of social gifting. You can select interests or search for the interests of friends. If you want to gift something to a friend who has listed his interests then obviously the work of finding gifts becomes less easy. Clips added to a wishlist can also serve the purpose of gifting to friends but it fails to match up to the features that are provided by social gifting startups like Badhai, BitGifting, Giveter, Giftbig, etc.

5. Profile Details and activities is a feature that lists your Profile details, Activities, Rewards and Refer n Win. Profile details is a self-explanatory feature and Activities is a feed that lists what all activities have been performed by people whom you follow. The platform also provides points on the activities that you perform and if you can refer 10 friends to the platform then you win a free t-shirt which is what the feature Refer n Win does.

However, there is one glitch while it creates a profile that is it follows people by default. How about suggesting users to follow based on your interests. A much required feature that is missing right now in Clipr.

Is Clipr making shopping an enjoyable experience?

Clipr is a neat shopping recommendation tool and design wise it is attractive too. The display of clips, adding reward points and displaying items on preferences are some of the exciting features of Clipr. However, it would be interesting to see if going further, it provides a platform for browsing as well as purchasing too. Another exciting feature could be that if Clipr could get some exciting offers from the product sellers otherwise it would be hard to think why one would come to Clipr rather than going to ecommerce sites.

Clipr also faces competition from startups that are in the same business such as Wooplr and Scrapehere. Though Wooplr is women focused for now but the appealing design and the presence on mobile scores. Scrapehere is also a social wishlist for shoppers that has some cool features like ‘Price Watch’ along with no-frills and user-friendly interface.

So, are you excited to give Clipr a spin or you need additional features to be added to make it more exciting?